How did Hiromu Arakawa remake Arslan?
Fullmetal Alchemist’s creator took on a thirty-year-old novel series, and treated it as a restoration, not a reboot.
When Kodansha announced in 2013 that Hiromu Arakawa would adapt Arslan, the pairing looked unlikely and proved exact: a meticulous storyteller for a meticulous novelist. Her manga follows Tanaka’s plot closely while rebuilding every face in her own clear, expressive line, FMA readers will recognise the bones, and the novels’ readers keep the story.
THE RUN
2013 → presentJuly 9, 2013 · Bessatsu Shōnen Magazine
The manga launches in Kodansha’s monthly shōnen magazine; the first collected volume follows on April 9, 2014.
Twenty-five volumes by October 2026
Still serialising, and well past the point where the Nakamura manga and both anime versions stopped. In 2025 Kodansha was already marking the approach of the final arc.
The FMA resemblance, addressed
Critics noted from the first chapters how Arakawa’s Arslan carries echoes of her own cast, the faces are hers, even when the helmets are Tanaka’s. It is a feature of the adaptation, not a shortcut: her Pars is a reading of the novels, openly signed.
IN ENGLISH
Kodansha USA, from 2014Print and digital · August 19, 2014
Kodansha USA began the English edition in both formats, and has kept it in print alongside the Japanese run.
The simulpub years
Crunchyroll Manga carried the series digitally in English from 2014 until Kodansha titles left the service in 2018.